Baroness Shriti Vadera

Shriti Vadera is the chair of Prudential plc and chair of The Royal Shakespeare Company. She co-chairs the World Bank Private Sector Investment Lab, which advises on ways to leverage the World Bank’s interventions to scale up private finance mobilization for climate and development in emerging markets.

She was previously the chair of Santander UK, a director of AstraZeneca and senior independent director of BHP. She has over 40 years of experience spanning public and private sectors, in the UK and internationally. Shriti started her career as an investment banker for 15 years with a particular focus on emerging markets. She joined the Council of Economic Advisers, HM Treasury in 1999, leading on policy areas for business, productivity, private finance, and international development issues.

From 2007–09, she was a UK government minister in the Cabinet Office, Business Department, and International Development Department. She was best known for leading the UK government’s response to the financial crisis, as a key architect of its pioneering bank recapitalization and funding plan in 2008, and helped design the outcomes of the G20 London Summit in 2009.

She read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Oxford University